Mahar says helping friend was not “ticket fixing”

A Hoosick Falls firefighter who received four tickets for an erratic-driving incident last summer had the charges dismissed and sealed after he was accompanied to his court hearing by a friend, Rensselaer County Sheriff Jack Mahar.
The motorist, 37-year-old Anthony J. Mazzone, was pulled over by a sheriff’s deputy in Brunswick on Aug. 4. The stop took place that evening after at least one person called 911 to report that Mazzone’s private vehicle, with a flashing blue fireman’s light on the dash, was allegedly being driven dangerously and forcing vehicles off the road as it traveled from Hoosick Falls into Brunswick, according to several law enforcement sources familiar with the incident.
But the details of what happened next are less clear. Mahar acknowledged Tuesday that Deputy Jaime Smith, who pulled over Mazzone, contacted the sheriff during the stop to relay that Mazzone indicated he was a friend of the sheriff and was on his way to meet him. Mahar said he knows Mazzone because they both served in the Marine Corps and were introduced at a Marine Corps League event.
“I just told her he’s a 100 percent disabled vet, that he has some issues,” Mahar said Tuesday. “I said to her, he calls me a lot, I talk to him, I know him and I said treat him no different than you would anybody else. I said I would talk to him later.”
The tickets are no longer listed as on file in the town court. A source close to the matter said they were sealed earlier this month under a deal that wiped any record of the tickets from Mazzone’s driving record if he went six months without an incident. The deal was approved by Brunswick Town Justice Robert H. Schmidt.
“I was in the courtroom,” Mahar said. “He (the judge) met with the deputy. I spoke with the judge but I always talk to Judge Schmidt, he’s a friend of mine.